The Reasons for a Lack of Assembling
by thewhitepatch
Summary: Tony Stark could use a friend after the Mandrian's forces attacked his house. Luckly, he should have the help of his good friends from the Avengers! The key word is "SHOULD"...


_This is a oneshot based on a conversation I had with my girlfriend. _

_For the record, I think Hawkeye is great. I just sorta made him pretty OOC for the sake of comedy, so don't get mad. _

_Don't own Marvel._

* * *

Tony Stark realized the hindsight was a bitch.

If Pepper were there, she would have said that he meant "Common sense, or your lack there of." In Tony's defense, it seemed like a good idea at the to tell a terrorist his exact home address as he called him out.

Now he was waiting in some kid's clubhouse, sipping on some crappy hot chocolate while his armor was charging. He know that the thing was going to need a crapton of charge in order to be fully charged, but Tony planned on covering the kid's power bill for that month, so hopefully his mom wouldn't get too mad at him.

The kid, Harley, was still probably going to be grounded when all of this was over. He lat a stranger into his house, Tony Stark or not.

Tony was trying to think of his next course of action when the kid spoke up. "Aren't you gonna call them?"

Tony stopped himself from sipping more of the crappy coco to respond to the kid. "Call who?"

Harley scratched his head and glanced over at the armor. "You know, the Avengers? Don't you have a bunch of super-powered friends who can help you?"

The thought hadn't occurred to Tony at this point. Now that he thought about it, though, it actually seemed pretty obvious. "I do." he said, as he began to smile. He walked over to the charging helmet and put it on his head.

Harley sat himself in front of Tony. "Can you at least put it on speaker? I wanna hear these guys."

"What, Iron Man isn't cool enough for you?"

"I'm kinda more of a Thor guy."

Tony flipped up his face plate. "That hurts, you know." He then flipped it down. "If I need to make more calls, you can listen in on those, but not this first one. Lets just say I don't think this guy can deal with children."

* * *

**NAME: ****Nick Fury**

* * *

Tony only had to wait a few minutes before hearing Fury's voice say, "Stark."

"Hey, Nicky! How's it going? How are the wife and kids? You know, in case you have any."

"News says your dead."

"Or husband and kids. Shouldn't be stereotypical here."

"You called for a reason, Stark?"

"Ok, look, I might have gotten myself into a bit of a jam, as you are already aware, so I was wondering if SHIELD could help me."

At first Tony heard nothing on the other end of the line. He assumed that Fury was checking something over, or in deep though about what to do. Tony figured he had done so much for SHIELD, even though it was stuff he would have likely done on his own, that they owned him a little.

Then he heard laughter.

There was no mistake about who was laughing. Nick Fury has a very unique voice. The disorienting part about it was the mere fact that Fury was laughing. It wasn't even a small chuckle that he was trying to hide from Stark. He was howling with laughter. At one point, Tony heard a small crash, and Fury's laughter became more faint. Tony would have thought the idea of Fury laughing so hard he fell out of his chair to be funny, but given his situation, he really had no time for it.

Fury eventually began to calm down, his laugh receding to a couple of chuckles before becoming complete silence. Tony assumed this would be a good place to get a word in.

"What I need are-"

The laughter returned, and Tony assumed that SHIELD would not be helping him out of this predicament.

* * *

**Name: ****Nick Fury **

**Reason:****Asshole**

* * *

Tony lifted up his face plate again, and took another sip of crappy coco .Well, it was actually growing on him at this point. Acquired taste, he supposed.

"How'd it go?" Harley asked, not hearing Tony's end of the conversation due to it being a soundproof helmet.

Tony avoided the question. "You like Thor, kid? Let's talk to Thor."

Harley managed to suppress his excitement. "Speaker?"

"Nah, I don't wanna catch him off guard."

* * *

**Name:****Thor, God of Thunder**

* * *

The cell phone in Jane's lab rang. She checked the caller ID, and picked it up.

"Hello, Mr. Stark."

"Hi, Jane. Thor there?"

"He's back in Asgard. You know that. You were there when he left."

"Oh, yeah. Good times, good times."

There was a awkward pause on the phone line.

"So," Tony said, "does it shoot lightning?"

"Goodbye, Mr. Stark."

Jane hung up the phone before Tony could respond. Darcy, who had overhead the speakerphone conversation, looked over at Jane. "But really, DOES it shoot lightning?" Jane slapped Darcy on the back of her head before returning to her work. Darcy rubbed her head as she muttered, "Totally does..."

* * *

**Name:****Thor, God of Thunder**

**Reason:****Currently in another dimension**

* * *

**Name: ****Clint Barton, AKA Hawkeye**

* * *

Clint was sitting at a coffee shop, not drinking his coffee. He was pretending to be absorbed in the Tony Stark news like everybody else there, but what he was actually paying attention to was a toy shop across the street. The shop had a display of Avengers toys produced by Stark Industries. All of them were represented by the toys. The stuffed Avengers were selling like hot cakes.

Except for the Hawkeye one.

Yes, it seemed that little boys and girls would scream at their parents as they walked by the toy store to allow them their pick of their favorite super hero. Almost every time, this super hero did not include Hawkeye.

Clint knew in the back of his mind that it was not health of him to spend all this time watching the toy shop. It was doing a number on his ego, and the coffee wasn't cheap either, but he needed an excuse to stay there. It crossed his mind how creepy it must be for a young man to make a habit out of fervently watching children at a toy store without a good excuse.

At leas this wasn't a bar. The only thing sadder then what he was doing now would be if he was doing it while getting drunk.

He turned his attention to the news. He knew better then the others that Tony Stark would not get himself killed that easily. What was bothering him was that Tony had yet to call them, or for that matter, him for assistance. He was pretty sure he had a health relationship with the genius. Maybe he wasn't as close to him as Banner, or commend his begrudging respect like Rogers, but he believed that Stark could call on him when needed.

Cause, you know, _friendship._

He looked down at his phone. Would it be considered rude to call him? Did Clint really want to degrade himself to the level of offering to help. Did he really have nothing better to do?

No! He was Hawkeye! He was cool! He could do whatever he wanted!

He saw out of the corner of his eye a small boy holding two stuffed toys. One of them was a Hawkeye toy, the other a Captain America one. He watched as the boy examined the the two toys, knowing that his mother would only let him pick one. The boy put down the Captain and began to make his way to the register.

There was no way the boy could know how much his decision would matter to one of the heros. It surprised Clint how much it actually mattered to him. He felt his day significantly improve.

The boy turned back at the last second and replaced the doll with a stuffed Hulk.

God damn it.

* * *

**Name: ****Clint Barton, AKA Hawkeye**

**Reason:****LOL Really?**

* * *

**Name:****Natasha Romanoff****_,_****AKA Black Widow**

* * *

Natasha does not get that much vacation time, working for SHIELD. She tends to always have something to do, given how important of a role she plays in very covert affairs. She could't remember the last time she honestly stayed in a hotel without it involving some undercover mission.

But, given that she was not necessary needed at the moment, as well as the fact that she had accumulated quite a number of sick/vacation days, Natasha decided to take a break. Currently she was at an undisclosed beach resort in Hawaii. She didn't really have any hobbies, aside from training, so this was the only thing she could think of doing.

She looked around at all of the different women on the beach. Most of them were just bimbo trophy wives who never worked a day in their lives. She was certain none of them have ever had to face down world destroying threats and barely getting out with their lives. She was certain that beach lounging and spa trips made up most of their days.

But, as she lied on a lounge chair on the beach, reading one of the many books she was getting caught up on in her free time, Natasha could not really blame them.

This _was_ relaxing. She was pretty sure she would hate not being on the job, and that she would be waiting for that call back into action when it eventually arrived. But, now that she was able to appreciate the relaxing nature of the beach, Natasha could not dream of returning to work.

At least not for a few days, anyway. She did want to get back to kicking ass for world security at some point or another.

After two days of vacationing, her phone rang. She only had the non-secure phone for civilian purposes, so there were not that many people that would use the line to call her. She did slightly keep up with the news, and knew all about the Mandarin crisis. She called back to base on her first day of vacation to make sure she wasn't needed. Given the current events, she knew exactly who was calling her, without checking caller ID.

She picked up the phone.

"Hey, Tasha, I-"

"Call me again in the next four day and I will destroy you."

"Noted."

She hung up, and returned to her book.

* * *

**Name:****Natasha Romanoff****_,_****AKA Black Widow**

**Reason: ****Vacation**

* * *

**Name: ****Steve Rogers, AKA Captain America**

* * *

Tony pretty much did this one to himself.

In any other case, Steve would rise right up to help Tony. The problem was that he had already done this a lot of pointless times beforehand.

Whenever Tony got drunk, it did not immediately occur to him to call a cab. Instead, he would drunk dial his "non-black BFF" to pick him up from where ever he was. It didn't matter if he was halfway across the world, for some reason he would still call Steve.

Steve had set himself a limit: he would only pick up Tony if he was within a three hour drive of his location. Other then that, he would call a cab for him. He didn't want his friend to be stuck drunk flying-his-armor-through-billboards.

Even if it was low on his priorities, wouldn't Steve help Tony once he got his call?

Well, funny story.

Steve had absolutely no idea how to work his cellphone. He had gotten one of those fancy touch screen ones at the advice of Tony. Tony never showed him how to use it, so he attempted to find someone who would show him. A quick internet search would show him that the stores offered learning classes for people who were as clueless as him. However, Steve also did not know how to search the internet.

Another thing that was taking up Steve's time was catching up on pop culture. He was currently caught up somewhere in the sixties. And he _loved_ the Beatles.

Long story short, the reason Steve was unable to hear Tony's call because he was too busy singing along to "Help" as loud as he could. By the time his neighbors complained about the noise, Tony would already have given up on the Captain.

* * *

**Name:****Steve Rogers, AKA Captain America**

**Reason: ****Combination of lowered priorities, technologic ineptitude, and Beatlemania.**

* * *

Tony sighed as he looked through the last of his contacts. "Guess there's only Bruce. He's pretty reliable so it'll be interesting to see why he can't help."

"Who's Bruce?" Harley asked.

"Never mind that." Tony was about to have JARVIS contact Banner when he received an incoming call. He saw the caller ID, and decided to let it go to message.

"Who is it?" Harley asked as the phone rang.

"Hawkeye."

"Oh," Harley nodded. "Gotcha." He remained silent, as he waited with Tony for the phone to stop ringing.

The helmet beep and the message played.

"Hi, Tony! Clint here! You know, Hawkeye? Yeah, just calling to check in. Was watching to news. Saw you on it. Thought you might need a hand. You know, like that time those aliens attacked New York. Wasn't that cool? Remember how I jumped off the building, but I fired an arrow at the same time. Yeah. Yeah good times. Anyway, just calling to say I have a bit of free time, and if you need anyone to shoot arrows at something, I'm your man. So, yeah. Call me. Bye."

The message ended. Harley and Tony sat in silence for a few seconds.

"Do you need someone to shoot arrows at something?" Harley asked.

"I know for a fact I do not." Tony replied, taking a large gulp of the crappy coco before having JARVIS attempt to contact Banner.

* * *

**Name:****Bruce Banner AKA the Hulk**

* * *

Bruce was using the ultra secure Hulk Freakout Room to test what sort of actions he could do before losing control of his temper and Hulking out.

He was surprised at what he could do. He managed to keep calm under ever different surprise that was thrown at him. He could keep his calm under constant pressure. He was proving to have pretty good control over his temper and adrenaline. He had yet to test a few things that had troubled him in the past, so he decided to test those out today.

He sat on a crappy, cheap plastic chair and prepared himself.

Little known fact about Bruce Banner: He absolutely refuses to watch the news. Too many things happen on it that cause him to get annoyed. Banner is a man who absolutely hates it when people jump to conclusions, for seeing that he used to find himself on the end of those conclusion. He tried to switch between new channels, but he always found something on each one that annoyed him. If the was something he really needed to know about, be would just hear about it from a friend or something.

Banner had really given up on politics. Yes, they were important, but it would be better for someone with his anger issues not to get caught up in political news.

Bruce prepped himself mentally, and turned on the TV.

"Tony Stark dead in mansion-"

"The Mandarin Strikes! Stark Falls-"

"Iron Man! More like Iron Dead-"

"No, really, who tells a terrorist their home address-"

Nobody could blame Bruce for choosing a bad news day to conduct his media test. At least he was in a safe and secure area when it happened. In a way, this was also Tony's fault, his bad planning and whatnot.

Banner would not awaken from his post-Hulk sleep until the next day, when most of the situation had blown over, and Tony no longer needed the help of his friends.

* * *

**Name:****Bruce Banner AKA the Hulk**

**Reason:****Hulk out**

* * *

Tony took off his helmet. "Assemble my ass." he muttered. He then began to leave. Harley stopped him.

"Can I go with you?" the boy asked.

"Sure, why not?" Tony shrugged. "Grab me a cup of that hot coco crap and we'll get moving. You get bullied, kid?"

"Uh...Yeah I guess?"

Tony handed him a device that he had taken out of his suit. "Take this painful, military-grade taser and use it on other children you don't like."

Tony Stark was on a role with the bad decisions. So it did sorta make sense that he would have to deal with the consequences himself.

* * *

_R&R!_


End file.
